culinary hipster tour of durham

Dec 17

Greetings from the South! I’ve been in Durham for about two days, and it’s been jam packed with fun, mostly of the food variety. Scott, Sara’s husband, picked me up from the airport after an uneventful flight (just the way I like it), and as I entered their house, Sara yelled, “Roomie!” (we still call each other that…she was my college roommate!) immediately followed by, “I love how that fits for both of you.” Sara and I called ourselves s^2 throughout college and thereafter, and since Sara and Scott are now also s^2, we are currently s^3 for the weekend.

It’s the little things, ha.

We wasted no time in getting out to explore Durham, with our first stop being the dtown market, a holiday craft fair. Coming from NYC, I never expect to be totally wowed by other places (if you’re a snobby New Yorker and you know, clap your hands.)…but I usually forget the charm of the smaller town. We ran into many of Sara’s grad school friends (some of who I remembered, others that took some reminding) and shopped the crafts, making some Christmas purchases and purchases for ourselves in the process. The highlight of the trip to the market was experiencing the food carts (a new-ish Durham phenomenon, as in NYC)…we had Korean BBQ for lunch followed by an ice cream sandwich with chocolate chip cookies on the outside and salted caramel ice cream in the middle.

I might move here just for the ice cream sandwiches. (Okay, maybe not…but so good.)

Immediately after we left the market, I commented to Sara on how I didn’t remember Durham being so hipster. It is hipster, so if anyone gets tired of Brooklyn, Durham will welcome you with open arms.

After some hanging out, we headed to Bull City Burger for some burgers, local beer, and sweet potato fries…also a hipster joint. This was followed by drinks at Alivia’s with Sara’s grad school friends. Getting the full Durham experience for sure.

Up until this point I had taken no pictures, and I made no apologizes for this picture-less post, as for the most part I’d rather enjoy the company instead of taking pictures of my burger. It looked like a burger…but had pimento cheese. (I want to take the time to thank Abbe for introducing me to the glory of pimento cheese.)

Sunday morning brought Sara’s long run of seven miles, which I agreed to run with her at her pace…her goal was 10:30 miles. Mark this post as the official “See! I can run at any pace!” for people who I offer to run with but comment, “You can’t run at my pace…” See! I can! And will!

So anyway. We set off for seven miles, during which we averaged 10:36 and I never ran a single step ahead of Sara. Victory. Sara had some knee pain, but we got through it…and I got a mini tour of the Alpha Delta Pi house (the sorority I was in for a bit in college, and Sara is the advisor here at Duke). Solid run…especially since it’s amazing to see how far Sara has come in her running!

See! Proof via my Garmin details…

I had attempted to coordinate a run with Sarah and her stroller, but babies are about as predictable as you would think, so we decided it would be best to not run together. We had brunch plans at Rue Cler, so Sara, Scott, and I met up with Sarah, Josh, and baby Annabel…I was so excited to see Sarah again and meet her little girl who is the cutest, happiest baby. (I must note that most babies I see are at work, and they cry when they see us coming because we do mean things to them…so there’s that.) Brunch was delicious and definitely fun to see Sarah again before they move to Miami!

Also, Annabel is enough to give you a bit of baby fever since she was so happy and really good throughout brunch. I promise she was happy even though she didn’t look all too pleased with our post-brunch picture…

These ladies make me feel SO TALL. Thank you Sara(h)s!

Fingers crossed for Sarah and Josh as they finish their medical training and enter the land of having “real” jobs. And that little A stays as awesome as she already is…although she wouldn’t say, “Go Bears!” for me as we were leaving. Which I guess is fair since she doesn’t actually say anything quite yet…

We’re on a strict Durham schedule (and Annabel is on a strict baby schedule…), so we said our goodbyes and headed to Tobacco Road, which is a brilliant sports bar here in Durham…SO MANY TVS, why don’t we do this in NYC? (Let’s watch football, friends.) The Redskins and Bears were all playing 1pm games, so we had the best of both worlds…and I even sat next to a Packers fan and we survived. Well, the Bears lost…but at least I had some good local beer…and Sara and I got to update our jersey picture, which is possibly one of my favorite pictures of us…ever.

Don’t you dare tell us we’re not cute. BEAR DOWN. (And HTTR…)

We napped during the 4pm games and got Nana’s tacos for dinner before watching the (long Sunday night game ever…) Pats game since Scott is a fan.

This morning led to another run, this time five miles with Sara’s grad school friend, Marissa. Marissa ran the Hot Chocolate 15k with us last December and has done many races with Sara. We ran fives miles around 10:30 pace, and we all made it…see! Let’s run slow! Then we laughed about the fact that I can’t bend over and touch my toes. At least I can run fast-ish.

Further proof. Dear everyone, let’s run together!

Post-run, we’re relaxing…or at least, I’m relaxing while Sara does some work, which more or less reminds me of the college days except usually I was the one doing work. (Glory of not being in school anymore?) Needless to say, Sara did send me this, a Facebook post from the NFL quarterbacks.

I heard her laugh about the Eli Manning part at the end that I told her was funny, then she gchatted me from upstairs about it:

I’m glad some things never change. Almost time for some outlet shopping, then heading to The Pit in Raleigh tonight, which Abbe has been talking up for awhile so I’m excited to experience it.

Any final Durham recommendations? Do you still keep in contact with your college roommate? I encourage comments on how cute Annabel is.